


Beside Every Great Superhero is an Equally Great Sidekick

by ozmissage



Category: The Fades
Genre: Angst and Humor, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-21
Updated: 2011-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-27 16:46:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/297947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ozmissage/pseuds/ozmissage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mac is okay with being the Sam to Paul's Frodo. More than okay, in fact.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beside Every Great Superhero is an Equally Great Sidekick

**Author's Note:**

  * For [movies_michelle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/movies_michelle/gifts).



> Thank you to perdiccas for the beta! Any lingering mistakes are my own. Disclaimer: the speech toward the end was borrowed from a certain movie about hobbits. May Peter Jackson forgive me for my sacrilegious paraphrasing.

“Sidekicks get a bad rap. The original Robin? He was an acrobat before he met Batman; he was in the actual circus, living the dream. And he’s his own man, isn’t he? He traded his tights in and became Nightwing _and_ he even got to be Batman for a bit. Samwise Gamgee? Seven-term mayor. Ron Weasley? He got the girl.”

Mac sits back in the booth as if his case has been rested. Paul takes a sip of his milkshake. Vanilla, today. He should have asked for strawberry.

“What’s your point?” he asks causing a disgruntled look to cross Mac’s face. Sometimes Paul forgets he’s always supposed to know what Mac is on about. It’s part of the best friend code.

“My point is I’m all right being the Robin to your Batman, the Sam to your Frodo, the Ron to your Harry. You can be the chosen one and I’ll be the one who does the carrying and all that.”

“Because you get to be mayor of The Shire?”

“Because I get to have sex with Hermione,” Mac says as he steals a chip from Paul’s plate and pops it into his own mouth. “Honestly Paul, are you listening to me at all?”

-

There is a small shed at the back of Mac’s property. It’s full of tools and holiday decorations, odds and ends Mac’s dad shoves into the space and then forgets about. When they were kids, Paul would go round to Mac’s and they would spend hours hunkered down in there pretending they were Ninja Turtles or pirates or two Han Solos who had been thrust into the same universe due to a rip in the fabric of time that threatened to swallow the Earth whole if they didn’t band together to patch it up.

Those were good times.

It has become home base for Paul’s training sessions now. They’re not official training sessions because Neil doesn’t know about them, but Paul prefers it that way. He would rather Mac be the only one to witness his attempts to move a rake with his mind. Neil would think that sort of thing was frivolous at best and idiotic at worst. Everyone is an embittered soldier in that guy’s head. It’s exhausting, even more exhausting than staring at a rake without blinking for ninety seconds.

“Anything?” Paul asks.

Mac gives Paul an apologetic shake of the head before sinking down to the cold cement floor beside him.

“I don’t think you’re telekinetic. It’s all right though. It happens to lots of superheroes. You’ve got healing powers and trust me, Bruce Wayne would kill for that kind of mojo, think of all the money he would save on ice packs.”

It’s true. Paul didn’t want to be telekinetic anyway. Honestly, he didn’t want any of this. It all makes him feel a bit insane when he thinks about it too hard. It’s like he’s going mad… but at least Mac is going with him.

“Mac?” Paul says keeping his eyes trained on his dirty shoelaces. They really could use a wash.

“Yeah?”

“I don’t think I can save the world.”

Mac shrugs. Paul doesn’t look up to see it happen, but he can feel Mac’s shoulders rise and fall against his own.

“Just do your best.”

Paul snorts.

“You sound like my mum before a big test day.”

Mac squeezes Paul’s shoulder like he’s Paul’s father instead of his best friend.

“Your mother is a very wise woman, Paul.”

It’s impossible not to grin at Mac when he gets like this.

“Shut up.”

“Oh but she is, wise _and_ gorgeous. She’s the full package--”

Even as he’s punching Mac in the arm, Paul can feel the tightness in his chest releasing. He thinks maybe he’s ready to try the rake again. If he has to have superpowers he would at least like to have one that was just for fun.

-

The mobile phone is cradled between Paul’s ear and his neck. He’s beginning to get a crick, but he is not remotely tired yet, and they don’t hang up until they are tired. It’s a rule. Besides, he has things he needs to talk about. Glowy, powerful Angelic things that only Mac can hear. Well, Paul supposes he could tell Neil, but Neil is a crap listener.

“What do you think ‘Angelic’ means exactly? Is it…does it prove…you know, God?”

Paul realizes he’s whispering. He’s not sure why, it just seems appropriate.

“I suppose so,” Mac says. “The better question is which god does it prove? Biblical, angry capital “G” God or Thor “God of Thunder” god? Or this could be a part of the--”

“Don’t say Matrix.” Paul isn’t in the mood for the Matrix theory tonight.

“Matrix,” Mac says forging ahead. “Think about it. You suddenly discover you have superpowers indicating a higher power, i.e. a sentient computer overlord controlling us all from a giant keyboard in the sky. We’re its Sims. It could make us do anything it wanted. Have sex in the middle of the highway or nick gum from the comic store--”

“You already nick gum from the comic store.”

“It’s not my fault. It’s the machine, Paul. It could be listening _right now_ \--”

There’s a pause. Paul is holding his breath and he knows on the other end, Mac’s holding his too. They let it out at the exact moment creating a swoosh of static like a mini-windstorm just swept through their phones. Paul laughs and hears Mac’s laugh echoing back as if it were his own.

“Or you could be Jesus.”

Paul rolls his eyes even though Mac can’t see him. “I’m not Jesus.”

“Don’t be hasty, let’s think this through. You’ve got the magical healing powers, the special destiny, the wings…”

“What Bible have you been reading? Jesus didn’t have wings.”

“Of course he did.”

“That part was left on the cutting room floor, was it?”

Mac yawns. “It’s in the extended edition.”

“You tired?” Paul asks.

“A bit.”

Paul’s not. Mac will stay on if he asks, but he hates asking.

“ _Chinatown_ ’s on in an hour,” Paul offers, keeping his voice casual.

“Excellent,” Mac replies without hesitation.

He never makes Paul ask.

-

Inviting Mac along to the movies seemed like a good idea. They’ve been to the movies dozens of times. Hundreds, maybe. Mac probably knows, he has been keeping a list of all the movies he’s seen since they were nine and they rarely ever see anything without each other. They’ve never had a girl along before though, unless they count Julie Carmichael from third year and since it was her birthday party it hardly seems appropriate.

Mac hangs back when they buy the tickets, his eyes lingering on Paul’s hand entwined with Jay’s. Guilt gnaws at Paul’s stomach and he is not sure why. They were bound to get girlfriends eventually. It’s nothing to feel guilty about; he’s not trading Mac in. He never would.

But sometimes Mac needs telling. Paul lets go of Jay’s hand.

“I just need a minute,” he says glancing back at Mac.

He walks the short distance to where Mac is pretending to study a poster for the latest Daniel Craig movie. It’s a ghost story. Given the current state of his life, Paul has no intention of ever watching another movie about ghosts again. Unless Bill Murray makes another _Ghostbusters_ , of course.

“You all right?” he asks.

“I’m fine. Wonderful, really. Fantastico.”

The lobby is quite crowded for a Sunday afternoon, so Paul leans in close.

“I just want you to get to know her better,” he says.

“I’ve known her since I was in footie pajamas,” Mac replies.

“You know what I mean.”

Stubborn as always, Mac looks away. It’s infuriating, is what it is. Paul wants to tell him so, he wants to tell Mac that if he made him choose, he would always choose him, but he might hate him the tiniest bit for it. Then Mac looks back and he’s smiling that silly half-smile that Paul’s known his whole life and he knows he could never say any of those things.

“I know what you mean,” Mac says. He buries his hands in his pockets and moves toward Jay without another word. “Tell me you bought the extra-large popcorn, Jay. It’s just good economic sense, otherwise you have to get up in the middle of the movie for more snacks and then you have no idea whose been incepted or what dream layer you’re in and you’re forced to loiter around the theater hoping the ushers don’t spot you before the next showing so you can watch the whole movie again.”

Jay arches an eyebrow at him. “Sorry, Mac. I bought a medium.”

Mac shakes his head in what Jay will no doubt interpret as mock disgust, but Paul knows it’s one hundred percent authentic.

“Rookie mistake,” Mac says before tutting at her. “Right, Paul?”

Paul steals a handful of popcorn. “Most definitely.”

“Traitor,” Jay teases.

Paul bumps fists with Mac. It’s nice to have them both here, both happy. He wishes he could freeze the moment, stop the film. If he could this would be the place to do it.

-

When it all goes to shit Paul stops talking. It’s not that he can’t speak. He knows he can. He dimly remembers a time when it was easy. Not around girls or strangers or in front of assemblies, but around Mac and his mum and Anna…and Jay. It’s impossible now. An actual impossible task.

The sky is still red.

He knows he will have to get up soon. Figure stuff out, be heroic—whatever. It doesn’t matter. Nothing does. For now, he stays in his room, tucked beneath his sheets having dreams that aren’t visions and that’s somehow even worse. He’d like to know what’s coming. Just a teaser trailer would suffice.  
Mac comes and goes. Says things that Paul can’t quite comprehend and then forces Paul to eat food he can’t seem to taste. The last sandwich had been tuna. He hates tuna. Mac knows that. Dimly, Paul realizes that’s probably why he brought it.

Day fades into night into day. It’s been a week, he thinks. A week since he broke the world.

Mac comes in without knocking. He’s not carrying any food this time and for that Paul is grateful.

“Bunch up,” he says and Paul obliges, scooting toward the middle of his bed. Mac crawls in beside him, all warm and solid, and drapes an arm around his waist. Then he begins to talk.

“I want to tell you something. We both know I’m good with the wit, but I haven’t quite reached my full potential on the wisdom front so I’m going to borrow some words from someone much wiser than myself.”

Mac clears his throat, and then the words start spilling out.

“I know, it's all wrong. By rights we shouldn't be here. But we are. It's like in the great stories, Paul. The ones that really mattered were full of darkness and danger. Sometimes you didn't even want to know the end… because…I always forget this bit,” Mac pauses to think. “Oh, right: how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? In the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come and when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. That bit always sounded a bit like bullshit to me, but who am I to argue with the likes of Jackson and Tolkien. Anyway…those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Paul, I do understand. I know now. The people in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something.”

Paul’s face is wet. At some point he began to cry.

“We saw that movie three…”Paul begins, his voice cracking from disuse.

“Four times in theater,” Mac finishes. “Twenty-nine times at home. Granted, I didn’t realize how applicable it would be to our current situation. My point is I can’t carry this Angelic, weight of the world crap for you, but I can carry you. And I will, for the record. Mordor, downstairs, wherever. I’m your Sam, okay? But you’ve got to get up.”

Paul takes a shaky breath and lets it out slow. He’s not sure he can do this, not sure at all. Mac’s arm tightens around his waist.

“Okay,” Paul says.


End file.
